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Aviation History
1961
1961 - 0674.PDF
684 FLIGHT, 18 Mcy 196, SERVICE AVIATION Air Force, Naval and Army Flying News This year's CFS Jet Provost aerobatic team in action: they make their first public appearance in Britain at next Monday's RAFA display at North Weald. Members are Fit Lts Frank Bram- bley (Idr) and David McCann, Pit Off Bruce Mc- Donald and Fit Lt Tom Whittingham. Reserves are Fit Lts Ian McKee and Walter Elsegood V-force Dispersal AS Flight's Gemini arrived over Scamp-ton on Wednesday of last week, forits pilot to see something of the Bomber Command dispersal exercise called May-flight, four Vulcans took off in rapid suc- cession and headed northward for aScottish airfield. This pattern was being followed at V-force stations all over thecountry, so that by 1700hr that day none of them—except for Scampton, the object ofa Press visit—had more than four aircraft left. Bomber Command's plan, stemming fromthe 1958 Defence White Paper require- ment that the retaliatory force should becapable of defending itself, is for the V- bombers to be so dispersed that with theThor bases—four complexes of five sites— an enemy would have to destroy about 50targets to prevent retaliation. In this plan each V-force base (assumingthree squadrons) has five dispersal sites, four aircraft being positioned on each ofthe six airfields. Readiness time has been gradually reduced to three minutes—bylinking the crews in their cockpits directly with Bomber Command HQ, by simultan-eous engine starting, and by "operational readiness platforms" at which the aircraftare in close proximity to the runway. At these dispersal airfields, facilities for crewsand maintenance personnel are completely self-contained and do not impinge on otheractivities; they are Bomber Command territory on what may be Royal Navy orMoA stations. Exercise Mayflight. testing the dispersalof the V-force, preceded Exercise Matador (see page 654) in which the Vulcans andVictors flew to exercise the UK defences and early-warning radars. At a presenta-tion at Scampton of Bomber Command's retaliatory role, all potential targets were shown as being within 1,500 n.m. of theUK; the V-force range was given as 2,500 n.m. and that of the Thors as "up to1,500 n.m." The warning, coming to Bomber Command from Whitehall, mightbe strategic or tactical. Even when scram- bled, the bombers "come back automatic-ally unless given a positive warning to go on." Whitehall and IDC TAKING over as Director-General ofManning from July 18, AVM J. G. W.Weston, CB, OBE, succeeds AVM D. M. T. Macdonald, CB, who is retiring from theRAF. The new director-general has been a member of the Imperial Defence Collegedirecting staff since March 1959 and is succeeded there by Air Cdre P. T. Philpott,Director of Joint Plans at Air Ministry since September 1959. Under the Umbrella MEMBERS of the Pathfinder Associa-tion at their annual dinner in Londonon May 8 took a typically searching and not wholly reverential look at the Royal AirForce. They heard from the Deputy Chief of the Air Staff, Air Marshal R. B. Lees,that nowadays "it's under the umbrella of Bomber Command that the rest of theAir Force goes to work"; and from the command's C-in-C, Air Marshal SirKenneth Cross, that his force possessed more aeroplanes than the two national aircorporations put together and had a hitting power equivalent to that of 29 millionLancasters. Whether they were properly impressed bythese facts—or by Air Marshal Lees' apostrophe of the anti-submarine accuracyof Coastal Command and the mobility of Fighter and Bomber Commands, and bySir Kenneth's praise for the 96 per cent accuracy of crews in the recent bombingcompetition—they relished the barbed aphorisms of TV sports commentatorKenneth Wolstenholme in his unerring vivisection of the guests. But it was perhapsPeter Swan who touched the pulse of peace and war most significantly, in his mentionof "people like myself, to whom the danger of life lies in cutting the lawn on a Sundaymorning,'" and his remark that though the PFF had finished at the end of the war itsspirit had continued. New Heart in the Squadrons HARDLY a dismal word about thepossibility of disbandment of uni-versity air squadrons was spoken at the recent annual dinner of Oxford UAS.The problem is that while the University still values the UAS as a club and for the tieswith the RAF which it represents, and while the RAF still values the air-mindedness inprospective top people, the Treasury looks askance at the £l£m it costs to run all thesquadrons each year, even though this sum represents only 1/500th of the RAFbudget. Financial planners are less and less impressed by the intangible benefits ofinstilling air-mindedness into a generation which, they feel, is almost automatically air-minded. The conflicting opinions seem to beapproaching reconciliation, for two critical reasons. The RAF is desperately short of pilots of high calibre and can see a require-ment for manned aircraft and the men tn man them for at least ten years ahead; andthe tangible returns in the form of aircrew recruits from the squadrons are reachingsignificant proportions. The forthcoming UAS review, set for June, is therefore notcausing serious disquiet. The new CO of Oxford UAS, Wg CdrR. P. Harding, noted the allocation of ne*quarters at the flying base at Bicester the affiliation of OUAS to RAF Abingdonduring the past year and the inclusion of the squadron in the visit to Oxford by theQueen last summer. Miss Round, secre- tary of the squadron since 1938, was madean MBE—richly deserved—in the New Year honours list. Tn lighter vein, the COobserved that Maj Gagarin had set a new fashion in circuits and bumps. Air Chief Marshal Sir Edmund Hudles-ton, VCAS, stressed the need for new air- crew in the RAF and noted the improvedUAS recruiting record. There was room. he observed, for intellectuals in the RAFand it was they who would face a challenge greater than that of the early pioneers andwho would be responsible for space achieve- ments in the future. Mr A. L. P. Norrington, the Vice-Chancellor, suggested that the link between the RAF and the universities was not onlyimportant, but should be strengthened and extended to any new universities whichmight be formed. He also suggested that the squadron should broaden its experi-ence by operating a helicopter which could then be used to speed the Vice-Chancelloron his many time-consuming visits to various parts of the country The Hack Trophy for the best all-roundmember of the squadron was presented to Fig Off A. C. Collins and the SiddeleyTrophy, for the best pilot, to Pit Off J. M. Macnair. Wg Cdr R. P. O'Donnell WE record with regret the death—onMay 10—of Wg Cdr Rudolph PeterO'Donnell, MVO, OBE, formerly Organizing Director of Music, RAF. Concernedthroughout his career with military music. first in the Army and then in the RoyalMarines, he transferred to the RAF in 1931 and in 1939 was appointed OrganizingDirector of Music. Subsequently he was responsible for forming three notablegroups, the RAF symphony, string and dance orchestras. Wg Cdr O'Donnellretired from the Service in 1949. IN BRIEF Fit Lt D. A. Proctor, No 7 FTS. Valle>-won the Wright Jubilee Trophy in the annual aerobatic competition for RAF instructorsFit Lt P. A. Clee, No 1 FTS, Linton-on-Ouse. came second and Sqn Ldr P. D. G. TernRAF College, Cranwell, was third. No 92 Sqn are making their first publicappearance in the UK as the RAF Fignter Command aerobatic team when they rertormat the RAFA Eastern Area Whit Monda; air display at Hucknall (see below). The RAFA are running two air displaynext Monday, May 22, and a third is bemt organized by SSAFA. As in previous years.the RAFA displays are at Hucknall, No's and North Weald, Essex; the SSAFA UispWis at Yeadon, the Leeds/Bradford airp.irt.
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